In Grim and Smoke
by Gender Outlaw
Summary: Once upon a time, there was a boy and his shadow, and they lived deep in the woods. Until the day the shadow grew hungry and tried to eat the boy. So the boy ran away and found a king who said "Lead me to this dark thing and I will slay it for you." And into the woods they returned. (Naruto runs from the dark, and finds Itachi.) Steampunk, Fairytale.


**Title:** In Grim and Smoke  
><strong>Recipient:<strong> passecerf  
><strong>Pairings:<strong> ItaNaruIta (Small FoxNaru)  
><strong>Warnings:<strong> Fairytales.  
><strong>Summary:<strong> Naruto runs from the dark, and finds Itachi.  
><strong>Author's Notes:<strong> I tried combining prompts. "Animal", "Fairytale", "Steampunk". I don't know how I did on the happy ending. Those things always elude me.

(_Originally posted in the itanaruswap livejournal group for their event. Cleaned up a little for FFnet.)  
>((Two years ~<strong>later<strong>~ but.. here it is.))  
><em>

* * *

><p>It was far in the sameness of the wood, where this once upon a time story began, where a boy lived with his shadow. Who grew long and twisted as the years progressed.<p>

They dwelled together, boy and shade, in the confines of a tiny wooden shack in the middle of a deep forest, which saw neither sunrise nor sunset. Only the pale hauntingly yellow glow of light that either was there, or wasn't. And trees in every corner of the sighted world, with brambles and branches that hung and grew so dark in the root, that they never seemed to touch the ground.

The boy loved to dream, and once asked of his shadow why they did not leave the woods together and find adventure.

"I am too old!" The shade replied. "And you are too young. Forget such foolish things, they only fill your head. For there is no way out of the woods. They may have once been tame, but they are feral now and there is no crossing through the path they hold."

But every night just before bed, the boy stared out of the lone window of their hut at the what could be seen of stars, and dreamt of what lay beyond.

"Surely," he mused, "there is more."

And went to bed. The dark sky twinkling down from above. In the morning, the dark shadows of the forest watching him, mocking him. During the evening, the dark corners of their house creeping up on him. And through the slowly dwindling years, the dark shadow of his shade growing steadily. Growing twisted.

Until it could wrap around the house from door to window to door again, and stand in the space between.

A knot grew in the boy's stomach. It felt like the time when he had cut his lip and accidentally swallowed the blood. But still the shade smiled in beastly curves of a face.

"He is like the wild beasts that stalk the night!" The boy thought, alarmed. "I see the bloody smile on his face. If I don't leave soon, he will eat me too!"

So he grabbed what things he would miss; a tiny wooden horse, a once shiny button, a long old blanket that he wrapped around his waist and draped over his shoulders. And a small wallet shaped like a frog. Then turned for the door.

"And where must you be going, in this growing dusk?" The shade called out from within the hut. Voice softly crawling from beneath the shadows of the yet unlit-house. "The sun has nearly set, and it is time for you to go to bed."

The words smooth as silk, the shade continued. "But you must eat first, of course. You are too skinny. You are wasting away and soon not all the witches in the world would be able to recognize you."

"I am not hungry," the boy murmured.

And the shade smiled. "Are you not?"

Then the boy turned, and ran into the woods.

–-

"And where are you off to in such a hurry at this late hour?"

The voice without an owner, suddenly bursting through the boy's fright. He faltered mid-run and spun on his heels. Surrounded by impenetrable darkness in every direction. "I ..! Some dark beast is after me. I know it wants to consume me whole."

A laugh, low to the ground and almost near the boy's knees. "Then you have come to the wrong place my friend, for we are all beasts here."

"Who – who are you?" He asked softly.

There was a rustling to the left and into the faint light of the stars stepped the voice. "You may call me what I am – the Fox."

"Fox.." The boy whispered. "Your fur is the same color as my hair. I have only seen the sun bare such a bold shade.."

"Be that as it may," the Fox mused as he sat. "It is usually polite to give one's own name in an introduction. And I have introduced myself to _you_."

"Ah!" The boy remembered his manners and gave a small bow. "My name is Naruto." Lifted himself straight and listened to the distance. "And.. I suppose now I am off to see the world."

His lingering terror easing gently as he thought of the edge of the only world he'd ever known, Naruto grinned just a little and looked down to the fox. "As for you?"

"My business is my own, is all I will say." But at Naruto's frown, the Fox continued. "Though I will see you to the end of the wood. That much I can do, for there is not much entertainment to be had in here but what one makes of one's own. And I will make mine of you."

–-

There is no end to the night, this far into the woods, and Naruto runs until his legs give out beneath him and he tumbles headfirst over a small hill, bursting through the brambles and thorns like a spinning top until he lands, exhausted and tangled, at the bottom.

Where he stays, arm flung sideways over his shoulder, as the Fox stares down at him from the top of the hill.

"I have never seen such a beast as you," The Fox says, amused. "It's a wonder you haven't been someone else's meal already."

And the day is just peeking through the thick canopy of trees when the Fox says, "Oh. It is past noon. You must be hungry, having run this far."

"I am not hungry," Naruto replies, pulling himself to his knees. "And I don't know why everyone keeps asking."

The Fox sits, and grins down at Naruto. "Perhaps your sister is just worried about you."

"What sister?" He stops and stares at the fox, bewildered. "What are you talking about?"

"Oh, nothing much." The Fox leans down and between bites at the fleas in his fur, continues. "I was just wondering whether you were the Beauty or the Beast."

Naruto is almost to his feet again, having used the hanging vines surrounding him as support to pull himself up. "What .. what are you talking about?"

"You do know there is no leaving these woods, do you not?" The Fox ignores Naruto, and bites down to his toes. "Once you have come inside, you are as much a beast as any of the rest of us."

–-

"But I can see the horizon from here!" And Naruto is weary and drenched in sweat, and still he denies the fox. "Stop asking me to rest and eat, I told you I am not hungry!"

"That is not the sky," The Fox persists. "It is only the clouds of your mind changing shape as you dream. When you wake, you will still be here. Foolish youngling, you are like the changing tadpoles. Not sure whether to swim or fly or howl to the moon and the sky."

And he laughed. "But if you want to chase these shades, go ahead. Not much waits for you beyond, but all I can do is warn."

Naruto does not like this sort of talk, and tries to ignore the fox. Pushing the thought of warping, twisting shadows and the lingering presence of his own shade far behind. Back, in the narrow confines of the wooden hut he grew up in.

-–

Itachi pulls his coat off the hook, a bright bundle of copper wires knotted in the shape of a hand, then swings it over his shoulders. He is wrapped in thickly stitched linen and his coat is made of heavy fabric – all brown leather and black buckles. It weighs him down and settles his wandering mind.

Years ago, Itachi's brother would have been tugging on his coat and spinning in circles around his brother so many times he becomes a soft breeze gently surrounding Itachi. Chattering away like a monkey and saying, 'Brother this', and 'brother that', until all Itachi can hear is a low-pitched ringing in his ears.

But Sasuke is at school, and Itachi is leaving home, again, to head for the docks and his father has already gone to work. His mother calls out to him from the kitchen where condensation leaks through the open door. The smell of roasting chicken and bubbling oil.

She tells him to be safe, to avoid the street cars. And she can ask, without seeing him, "When are you coming home?"

"_Where are you going?" _She used to say. _"Why do you stay away so late?"_

With a worried voice. _"Just wait a little while longer. When your father gets home, he will take you. Why do you stay so late?" _But he's not home.

And her voice only buzzes through Itachi. The past echoing with the present. He can already see her standing at the stove in his mind, working the pump to keep the fire bellowing and replies,

"Yes, mother." His voice soft and unhurried.

The train is late, or the whistle is atleast, and the sharp scream of metal on metal cries out over the din of a thousand voices.

A thousand people, brushing against and pushing against each other, fighting for a piece of ground to walk on. The undercurrent of horse hooves clipping, the carriages rolling past. The city is built like a child's playset – all crisscrossing angles and no direction. Shadows and stains spilling out of every corner.

Steam everywhere, circling the earth like a cloud.

And Itachi is walking through it all. On his way to the factory, where the walls are an even dimmer sight than the city. It is a cave of rusted steel girders and twisted wiring snaking up and down the halls. And he can hear the whistle and hum blasting through still.

From the baker's shop, where the cook can barely be heard taking customer's orders over the blasts of air as his assistant works the bellows. From the tailor's, where the needle clings and clangs like a dart again and again as the smith winds the wheel with one hand and guides with the other.

The smoke and the vapors pouring down the street.

Itachi is late. He gets later every day, but he never seems to notice. The steady tick of all the clocks in every window, on every corner dulls. Slows. Until the gray haze of the world in morning and the grayer haze at night blends into one smooth shade that never changes.

"_Where are you going, Itachi? When are you coming home?"_

–-

The beast was right, Naruto thinks, as he recoils from the noise and confusion. There are only monsters on the edge of the world. Great, terrifying beasts that belch smoke and so much breathe fire. Horrific creatures with long necks and mutated bodies.

Walking underneath, or carrying people. People nothing like the hazy reflection the riverbed showed him of himself. Dark hair, dark eyes, and dark stares.

They ignore Naruto as he passes by. Wide-eyed and staring, in the middle of the street.

"If all the world is like this, I wonder why I ever left." He muses to himself. Jumping to the side when a man pulls out a long handled contraption of cloth and wires, and opens it with a _pop_. Then raises it over his head, the upside-down 'u' shape casting a relief from this new sun that shines and shines and never stops.

Where is the canopy that kept the sun at bay? Where are the ever-woven trees that hid the rising and the setting? That confiscated that fierce gaze? But.

But if he could have a personal cloud like that man, maybe he could find some worth in a world like this. And so Naruto cringes as he dodges the carriages and commuters, struggling to keep sight of the upraised cloth in a throng like this.

The fox follows and says nothing. Has said nothing all morning since they left the forest.

–-

There are shades in the midst. Naruto sees shadows in every direction, clinging to the shoes that move around him like footsteps. Stitched on with thread so black it is almost invisible.

But Naruto sees.

He sees the darkness lurking in the cracks between welds – between the metal pipes and tubing. Sweeping under the smoke and clouds.

He spins and spins, and can't find his way out.

-–

And Itachi is standing at the streetcorner, staring at the light, waiting.

His hands in his pockets, his head in the clouds. If he stares hard enough, sometimes he can see blue through the clouds.

If he waits long enough, the smoke might go away.

-–

"Where are we?" Naruto calls out to the fox, who still doesn't answer.

"I thought this was the horizon, but there are no trees just more hungry beasts screaming for blood and nothing makes sense. Here I can walk in one direction, turn, and have gone nowhere. Where can we go? What's left from this?"

"Go home," Itachi answers from a few feet over, his gaze unchanged. "Go back to what you left behind."

The fox at Naruto's feet, biting the away fleas buried in his soft fur. Triming off the tips of his nails with his teeth as he tells Naruto that this is what he said all along.

Wondering what Itachi's running from, himself.

But Itachi doesn't hear, or doesn't answer. It makes little difference in the end as the fox has no voice in the city, and Naruto walks up to Itachi and grabs his coat sleeve.

"How am I to find my way back? Why would I go? Some dark beast is after me, and it will eat me whole if I let it. How can I find the way out if I don't know the way in?" His eyes determined. Stepping close to Itachi, pulling him closer.

"There are no monsters," Itachi eludes. His eyes drifting from the hazy glow of the streetlamp, to the bright gray of the sky, to the solid gold of Naruto's hair.

Naruto won't let go, and takes Itachi with him as he steps backwards away from the evening train whistle.

"My world is dark," He says, hands clenching and unclenching Itachi's coat as he tries to watch every sudden noise at once. "It is clothed in shadows and blackness that threaten to swallow up from beneath. I can't go back. But I can't stay in a place like this, where there is no end to the sun, and the beasts that once lay in wait are now out in the open, with no need to hide.

"What kind of a world is this you live in anyway?" Meeting Itachi's gaze no matter what direction his eyes go.

Itachi listens. And looks at the fox.

"I don't know what sorts of things you are running from," Itachi tells Naruto. "But if you try to outrun them now, they will only follow you all your life and eventually find you. It is best to just head back and meet them head on."

"There is nothing but time here," he continues. "So I will take it with me and come with you back to your dark world." His hands out of his pockets, he takes Naruto's and pulls them from his coat.

"Show me these monsters of yours." He says, and leads Naruto by the hand to the edge of the city.

–-

_Once upon a time, there was a boy and his shadow, and they lived deep in the woods. Until the day the shadow grew hungry and tried to eat the boy. So the boy ran away and found a king who said "Lead me to this dark thing and I will slay it for you." And into the woods they returned. _

_A boy and his skeleton. A boy and his shadow._

"_I told you,"_ said the Fox. As the bustle and haze and din of the city falls way behind them. _"That there was nothing out there for you to find."_

"I found a friend," Naruto replies. "Which is more than I started with, I suppose. I can't see the moon at night, and there I'm lost."


End file.
